The rocky red earth fields of southern Syria spread in a flat plain in front of Damascus. The view was clear this week: no Syrian military buildup on its Israeli and Jordanian borders. "The army is on high alert," a Syrian government official said, but he insisted there had been no major troops movements since the Persian Gulf War broke out last week. Western diplomats in the capital say that their intelligence information is the same.

BEIRUT - Israeli warplanes struck targets late Monday near the Lebanese-Syrian border, according to news and official accounts, but there were conflicting reports about whether the areas hit were on Syrian or Lebanese soil. The official Lebanese news agency said Israeli warplanes “launched two raids” in a mountainous area in the vicinity of the Lebanese village of Nabi Sheet. There was no comment from the Israeli government. There was also no official word on possible casualties.

Thousands of Iraqi army troops, backed by U.S. forces, launched a major assault Saturday in the northern insurgent stronghold of Tall Afar, with Iraqi government officials stressing that the offensive was part of a long-range strategy to stop foreign fighters entering the country from Syria. American artillery and warplanes began bombing Tall Afar's Sareya neighborhood before 2 a.m., clearing the way for Iraqi special forces units to enter the city.

REYHANLI, Turkey - In this bustling border town, anonymous apartments serve as safe houses for Syrian rebel commanders, clinics for wounded fighters and opposition media centers equipped with banks of sophisticated laptops and video gear. Turkey has allowed an assemblage of Syrian rebels and their associates, including secular activists, cash-wielding sheiks, arms traffickers and Islamist militants, to use its territory as a transit route, logistics hub and rest stop. The government has been very clear that it wants to see Syrian President Bashar Assad removed from power.

BEIRUT - Israeli warplanes struck targets late Monday near the Lebanese-Syrian border, according to news and official accounts, but there were conflicting reports about whether the areas hit were on Syrian or Lebanese soil. The official Lebanese news agency said Israeli warplanes “launched two raids” in a mountainous area in the vicinity of the Lebanese village of Nabi Sheet. There was no comment from the Israeli government. There was also no official word on possible casualties.

HACIPASA, Turkey - The turrets of Turkish armored vehicles rise from the cotton fields outside this border village, guns trained toward Syria. Infantry units flank the banks of the Orontes River as Syrians escaping the fighting in their homeland maneuver across its muddy waters in rowboats. Overhead, Turkish fighter jets periodically buzz the skies. The two nations' more-than-500-mile border has become a tinderbox that many fear could become the spark for a regional war that no one seems to want but that appears to be closer than ever.

U.S. troops and warplanes killed 20 suspected insurgents Saturday while destroying houses near the Syrian border, the military said. Elsewhere, four service members were reported killed, pushing the U.S. military death toll to 1,996. U.S. forces found weapons and ammunition in the raids in Husaybah, the military said. Troops set off a car bomb found near one building, and the Air Force bombed the houses. No U.S.

BEIRUT - Fierce fighting in a border town in northeastern Syrian sent about 8,000 people fleeing into neighboring Turkey over a 24-hour period, one of the largest single-day surges of refugees since the Syrian conflict began, officials said Friday. Driving the sudden exodus that began Thursday was intense fighting in the northeastern Syrian border city of Ras Ayn, where rebels were reported to have seized security compounds and occupied much of the town. Panicked civilians fled en masse, dodging gunfire and shelling and in some cases struggling to get through barbed-wire fences along the frontier.

REYHANLI, Turkey - In this bustling border town, anonymous apartments serve as safe houses for Syrian rebel commanders, clinics for wounded fighters and opposition media centers equipped with banks of sophisticated laptops and video gear. Turkey has allowed an assemblage of Syrian rebels and their associates, including secular activists, cash-wielding sheiks, arms traffickers and Islamist militants, to use its territory as a transit route, logistics hub and rest stop. The government has been very clear that it wants to see Syrian President Bashar Assad removed from power.

BEIRUT - A minibus explosion at a crossing on the Turkish-Syrian border killed more than a dozen people Monday, and some activists said its target might have been one of the leading figures in the Syrian opposition. The blast struck the Turkish side of the border minutes after George Sabra, vice president of the Syrian National Coalition, passed through, several opposition activists said. Sabra was returning to Turkey after a trip to the city of Aleppo, in nearby Idlib province, said opposition activist Ahmad Aasi.

BEIRUT - At least 42 people were reported dead Saturday in a pair of car bombings in the southern Turkish town of Reyhanli, the latest apparent example of spillover violence from the conflict in nearby Syria. More than 140 people were injured, with at least 20 in critical condition, according to Turkish officials and news reports. The blasts reportedly caused panic in the town, where tension has arisen between Syrian refugees and Turkish residents. Reyhanli, in Hatay province, is just a few miles from the Syrian border and has been a magnet for Syrian refugees and rebels.

BEIRUT - Twenty-one United Nations peacekeepers held by rebels in southern Syria were released Saturday and were safe in neighboring Jordan after a three-day ordeal that dramatized anew how the Syrian conflict has destabilized the region. The U.N. confirmed the release and Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued a statement thanking "all concerned" for the troops' liberation. Video showed the peacekeepers, all of them Filipinos, arriving Saturday in the Jordanian capital, Amman.

BEIRUT - A minibus explosion at a crossing on the Turkish-Syrian border killed more than a dozen people Monday, and some activists said its target might have been one of the leading figures in the Syrian opposition. The blast struck the Turkish side of the border minutes after George Sabra, vice president of the Syrian National Coalition, passed through, several opposition activists said. Sabra was returning to Turkey after a trip to the city of Aleppo, in nearby Idlib province, said opposition activist Ahmad Aasi.

BEIRUT - Fierce fighting in a border town in northeastern Syrian sent about 8,000 people fleeing into neighboring Turkey over a 24-hour period, one of the largest single-day surges of refugees since the Syrian conflict began, officials said Friday. Driving the sudden exodus that began Thursday was intense fighting in the northeastern Syrian border city of Ras Ayn, where rebels were reported to have seized security compounds and occupied much of the town. Panicked civilians fled en masse, dodging gunfire and shelling and in some cases struggling to get through barbed-wire fences along the frontier.

HACIPASA, Turkey - The turrets of Turkish armored vehicles rise from the cotton fields outside this border village, guns trained toward Syria. Infantry units flank the banks of the Orontes River as Syrians escaping the fighting in their homeland maneuver across its muddy waters in rowboats. Overhead, Turkish fighter jets periodically buzz the skies. The two nations' more-than-500-mile border has become a tinderbox that many fear could become the spark for a regional war that no one seems to want but that appears to be closer than ever.

October 10, 2008 | Ziad Haidar and Borzou Daragahi, Special to The Times

Two American journalists reported missing in the Middle East by their families were safe here in the Syrian capital Thursday after they crossed the border from Lebanon, were stopped by security officials and interrogated, Syrian officials said. By day's end, a Western news agency citing an unnamed U.S. diplomat reported that the pair had been handed to American officials in Damascus, though the statements could not be immediately confirmed. "They are safe and in U.S.

Israeli jet fighters attacked bases of a PLO faction opposed to Yasser Arafat in eastern Lebanon on Monday, killing 10 guerrillas and 10 residents in the deepest thrust into Syrian-held territory this year, authorities said. The fourth Israeli air raid on Lebanon this year coincided with the eighth day of Beirut sectarian violence sparked by opposition to Syrian military intervention. At least eight more people were killed in the fighting Monday.

The top U.S. military commander for the Middle East offered rare words of praise Thursday for Syria, saying Damascus has taken steps to stop the movement of foreign fighters over its border into Iraq. Army Gen. John P. Abizaid said Syria had begun taking action on long-standing complaints by the United States about foreign fighters, one of several issues dividing the two countries. Abizaid, the chief of U.S. Central Command, was asked by Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.